Road to Katrinaville

The idea of the Katrina cottage was always bigger than the house itself. It started with New Urbanist architects, who began drawing pictures of colorful...

Marianne Cusato designed the first “Katrina Cottage” soon after the hurricane season of 2005. It was an immediate hit among architects, builders and disaster planners, who saw it as a livable form of post-disaster housing. And because the durable cottages could be expanded over time, they were seen as potential building blocks of permanent communities. Photo by Christopher Swope.

The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency embraced the cottage concept. Using $275 million from a federal pilot program, MEMA designed its own 1-, 2- and 3-bedroom “Mississippi Cottages,” and ordered 2,800 of them for families along the Gulf Coast. Image courtesy of MEMA.

Rebuilding is going slowly, thanks to the high cost of insurance, the national mortgage meltdown and other obstacles. For the most part, families who received cottages have liked them—especially compared with notoriously cramped FEMA trailers. Photo by David Kidd. David Kidd

Factory-built MEMA cottages arrived furnished, right down to the silverware, dishes and towels in the kitchen. They were built to withstand winds as high as 150 mph. Photo by David Kidd.

Although designed to be permanent, most local governments wanted the cottages moved to trailer parks. Waveland, obliterated by Katrina, argued that the cottages would drag down property values. Residents there sued the town for the right to stay in cottages on their land. Photo by David Kidd.

The 2-year pilot program is winding down, and MEMA is offering cottage dwellers a choice: They can buy their cottages, or they can move on and MEMA will take them back. Cheryl Kring (shown with her stepson Andrew) is one of hundreds who are weighing what to do. Photo by David Kidd.

Mary Sherrouse tried to rebuild her home in Waveland, but her contractor botched the foundation work. Now, she is considering buying her cottage instead. Because Sherrouse is elderly, the state offered it to her for $547. Photo by David Kidd. David Kidd

Reluctantly, most local governments have agreed to let cottages stay, but with tight restrictions. Waveland will not let Marilyn Gambrell stay in her cottage because she did not own the house she lived in before Katrina. Photo by David Kidd.

MEMA is trucking away unpurchased cottages by the dozen. Some belonged to people who rebuilt and, happily, don’t need them anymore. Others were located in flood zones where cottages were never meant to stay for good. Here, hundreds of cottages sit in storage near Gulfport while MEMA figures out what to do with them. Photo by David Kidd.

A local chapter of Habitat for Humanity expanded this MEMA cottage to demonstrate how the small cottages can grow over time. Photo by David Kidd. David Kidd

In Ocean Springs, architect Bruce Tolar is assembling “Cottage Square,” a living museum of the Katrina-cottage movement. Early designs of cottages are here, along with 8 MEMA cottages that just arrived and have been rented to locals displaced by the storm. Photo by David Kidd. Donovan Scruggs

Bruce Tolar sees Cottage Square as a template for how to make a real community out of post-disaster housing. Several cottages are used as offices and businesses, and the neighborhood is within walking distance of a grocery store, a school and Ocean Springs’ main street. Photo by David Kidd.

A lone MEMA cottage can look meager when set on a big empty lot. But when assembled together, as they are at Cottage Square, the sum can seem greater than the parts. Photo by David Kidd.

Cottage Square’s promoters have taken to calling this block the “historic district.” On the left is Marianne Cusato’s original Katrina Cottage. Next to it is a cottage designed by Bruce Tolar. The orange home was Cusato’s model for the Katrina Cottage kit house sold by Lowe’s. Photo by David Kidd.

The idea of the Katrina cottage was always bigger than the house itself. It started with New Urbanist architects, who began drawing pictures of colorful little homes shortly after the terrible hurricane season of 2005. Within months, a 308-square-foot prototype was the hot topic at the world's biggest homebuilders' show. Disaster planners took notice, too -- especially when "FEMA trailers" turned out to be a disaster of their own, with cramped spaces that made people sick from formaldehyde. Katrina cottages, by contrast, were livable, lovable and durable enough to withstand 150 mph winds. And the modular design could be expanded over time as a family's circumstances permitted. More than anything, the Katrina cottage was about practicality: The trim porches and pitched roofs represented an investment in something permanent -- crisis housing that could outlive the crisis.

The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency embraced this concept right away. Through a federal pilot program, MEMA designed its own one-, two- and three-bedroom versions of the cottage, and rolled 2,800 of them out along the Gulf Coast to people who were still stuck in trailers. Now, two years later, the state agency is asking cottage dwellers to make a choice. They can buy their cottages at bargain prices ranging from $500 to $10,000 -- depending on income -- and secure them on permanent foundations. Or they can move on, and MEMA will take their cottages back. MEMA's preference is for residents to buy the cottages and stay put, but support for this plan is shaky at the local level. Up and down the coast, weary residents and local governments, which control the zoning, are debating the Katrina cottage's existential question: Can these homes really be forever?

Local officials are reluctant to say yes. Some see the cottages as mere shotgun shacks on wheels, and argue that allowing them to stay in place will drag down property values. That's an odd case to make in neighborhoods where rebuilding has barely begun and abandoned lots are going to jungle. Nevertheless, localities have found language in their codes to back it. In Gautier, even the largest MEMA cottages fall short of a mandate that homes in residential areas be at least 1,325 square feet. Bay St. Louis and Waveland tried to force cottages into mobile-home parks or out of the city limits entirely. After the Mississippi Center for Justice rallied eight cottage residents to sue Waveland, most jurisdictions have begun agreeing to let people stay in their cottages if they want to. Still, there are tight restrictions. In Gulfport, cottage residents are not allowed to keep a unit on their own property if a landowner within 160 feet objects.

Mary Sherrouse, who lives alone in a tidy two-bedroom MEMA cottage in Waveland, doesn't see what the fuss is about. "Everyone who has one wants to keep it," she says. "Unless they've rebuilt." Sherrouse tried to rebuild, too, but her contractor botched the foundation. Now Sherrouse is considering buying her cottage instead. MEMA offered it to her for $547. She imagines making additions that would give her more living room and bedroom space. "My daddy built his house here in 1940," Sherrouse says. "I don't want to leave. It's home."

As Sherrouse weighs her options, MEMA is trucking away unpurchased cottages by the dozen. Some belonged to people who have rebuilt and, happily, don't need them anymore. Others were located in flood zones where the cottages were never meant to stay for good. For the time being, all are headed to temporary storage sites while MEMA figures out what to do with them. Mike Womack, MEMA's executive director, says he'd like to see all of the cottages find a home in one of the six counties Katrina raked the hardest. But if the locals won't take them, he'll offer the cottages to other parts of the state. "It makes no sense to have a unit sitting unoccupied," Womack says, "when we know we have housing needs throughout Mississippi."